Most of what you wear and eat, you can make. Gathering skills bring in the raw materials; crafting skills turn them into something worth having. Both pay experience, and both fill your curse meter a little each time.
Who makes what
| Gather with | Then craft with | To make |
|---|---|---|
 Mining: ore, coal, clay |  Forging at a furnace and an anvil | Bars, then metal weapons, plate armor, pickaxes and axes |
 Woodcutting: logs |  Survival at a crafting bench | Bows, arrows, unenchanted wands and staves, and leather and fur armor |
| Picking plants and fibres |  Artisan | Thread, bowstrings, cloth and silk, glass and clay work, and jewelry from silver, gold and platinum |
| Herbs and ingredients |  Arcana at an alchemy table | Potions and brews, and enchanted wands, staves and jewelry |
 Fishing, vegetables, meat from creatures |  Cooking at a range or a campfire | Food |
| Ichor and totems, for charge |  Occultism | Charged rings and amulets, from their uncharged versions |
The crafting pages list every recipe by skill and station, and the gathering pages every spot.
Gathering in short
- A better tool raises your chance per attempt; your level only makes you faster.
- Most rocks and trees can be hit with the right tool in your main hand instead. Empty the bar and the gather is guaranteed.
- Every spot runs dry after a few successes and refills a while later. A better tool than the spot needs gets you a few free successes first.
The numbers are on gathering.
Crafting in short
- Many recipes come with a short minigame. Your first craft of those has to be by hand; after that you can craft them automatically.
- The minigame grades you from C to S. By hand, that grade sets the quality odds and you earn 1.75 times the experience. On automatic, your best grade so far sets the odds.
- Only gear rolls a quality. For bows and wands the quality is rolled on the unstrung bow or unenchanted wand, and carried over when you finish it.
The numbers are on crafting grades.
A first chain
The tutorial walks you through one of these already. The metal one runs like this:
- Take a
Copper Pickaxe into the Kal Mine and mine 
Copper Ore. - Smelt it into a
Copper Bar at a furnace. - Forge the bars at an anvil into a
Copper Sword, then plate armor once your Forging allows it. - Move up to
Iron Ore at Mining 10, and so on up the metals.
The wood one:
- Take a
Copper Axe to the poplar trees for 
Poplar Logs. - Carve an
Unstrung Poplar Shortbow or an 
Unenchanted Poplar Wand at a crafting bench with Survival. - String the bow with a
Bowstring spun from 
Flax, or enchant the wand with Arcana.
Where to put your time
- Quests ask for crafting levels. The Lost Artist wants Arcana 13, Fishing 3 and Cooking 3; Persistence wants Mining 25; The Mystery Of The Meat wants Cooking 27; Paths Diverge wants Artisan 31.
- Gather what you craft with. Levelling Mining alongside Forging, or Woodcutting alongside Survival, means you are never buying materials.
- Sell the surplus. See making money.
- Task boards pay coins and experience for gathering and crafting you were going to do anyway. See the path of the Warden.